NTT Agrees to Split in Return
For Entry into Global Market

By

David P. Hamilton Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Updated Dec. 6, 1996 12:01 a.m. ET

TOKYO -- Japanese phone giant Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. has agreed to its own breakup, reversing its 14-year resistance to the plan in a bold bid to join the global big leagues of telecommunications carriers.

Under the agreement reached by NTT and Japan's Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, NTT's operations will be split up into two regional local-phone carriers and one long-distance company. Yet NTT's split won't be anywhere near as thorough as that of AT&T Corp. in the U.S. more than a decade ago,...